Pleas From Calipari Fall On Deaf Ears, Blind Eyes

NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament - Final Four - Notebook

March 31, 1996|By Alan Schmadtke of The Sentinel Staff

UMass coach John Calipari spent part of the second half pleading with officials to call the game evenly, a reaction to a pair of inside three-point plays by Kentucky. Finally, referee Ed Hightower warned the coach when Calipari screamed when a close call was called a jump ball. The ball went to Kentucky. ''If you're going to talk to us, you're going to talk to us in a decent manner. I want to make that perfectly clear,'' Hightower told Calipari. ''Now, apparently he didn't see it because the ball went out of there too fast. OK?''

WILDCATS TAME FROM 3-POINT LAND

ALL YEAR the barometer for Kentucky was how it shot from 3-point land. Turns out this time it didn't matter. The Wildcats took only nine, made three and never let it be a key against UMass.

MEDIA IMPOSTERS

SECURITY GUARDS at the Meadowlands were on edge. That's because they were looking for imposters who picked up credentials for writers for representatives of four newspapers, including the Los Angeles Daily News and Chicago Tribune. ''They slipped through,'' said assistant Sun Belt Conference Commissioner Tom Burnett, who helped give out some media credentials. ''Something like this happens every year, where people try to re-create credentials, but this year somebody was more creative.'' Guards caught and arrested two of them Saturday.

BRIEFLY . . .

WHILE COACH Rick Pitino called UMass the most dominant team of the past two seasons, Kentucky has owned the Minutemen in the 1990s. The Wildcats hold a 4-1 series edge. . . . The Minutemen's backcourt of Carmelo Travieso and Edgar Padilla struggled against Kentucky's constant pressure. Travieso was 3 of 7 shooting, and Padilla, the primary ballhandler, was 2 of 10. . . . Although this is Kentucky's first chance to play in a national championship game since 1978, it's coach Pitino's first. ''We're very excited about that, but in no way will we underestimate Syracuse,'' Pitino said.